


Green Socks and Beer

by a_xmasmurder



Series: Bucky Barnes Finds a Friend [5]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alcohol and Shooting Things, Bonding, Bucky Barnes finds a Friend, Cats, Friendship, Gen, Insomnia, Male Bonding, PTSD - Symptoms, Pets
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-05
Updated: 2015-01-05
Packaged: 2018-03-05 12:57:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,465
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3120983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/a_xmasmurder/pseuds/a_xmasmurder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Bucky can't sleep. Neither can Clint. This is quickly becoming the norm.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Green Socks and Beer

**Author's Note:**

> Help me, this is starting to turn into something else.

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

 

Bucky stares at the ceiling in defeat. “I’d like to actually sleep.”

 

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.  Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

 

He turns his head to his nightstand and groans when he sees the time.

 

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

 

“Alright! Alright, I’m up. I’m awake.” He flings out his arm and knocks the alarm off the table. It continues to announce the ungodly time at full volume despite the tumble. Bucky flops back to the pillows and growls. “Still awake. Shut up.”

 

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Bee -**

 

“Ugh.” He throws the covers back and gets out of bed, kicking the alarm under it and forgoing clothes to walk naked to the bathroom. The irritating sound follows him. He doesn’t bother with the overhead light; he knows where everything is by touch. As much as everyone likes to play pranks and mess around with each other, the one thing they don’t do is switch things around. That’s just not done around here, for many legitimate and very good reasons. The names of two of those reasons are Bucky Barnes and Clint Barton, twitchy paranoids that they are.

He grabs his razor and turns the water on, savoring the soothing sound of it hitting the basin and drowning out the incessant alarm. He scrapes at his chin and cheeks, eyes closed, and slaps some aftershave on. The tile floor is cold on his feet, a nice contrast to the steaming hot water. He wiggles his toes, washes his hands off before rubbing his aching eyes, then uses the toilet. After another quick hand wash he turns the water off.

 

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

 

Back into the bedroom he goes, cursing the clock. He’s glad there isn’t shit scattered on the floor to trip him up as he shuffles around the room. He doesn’t have much to himself; never did as a kid - and what he did have, he shared with Steve because that kid was poorer than he - and he had even less while he was in the hands of Red Skull and the Red Room...and H.Y.D.R.A. of course. Now that the U.S. government is finally coming through on the benefits for himself and Steve, they have the money to spend. It’s more than they are used to, that’s for sure. They don’t have much between them now by choice. The 'waste not, want not' mentality is so ingrained that they can’t quite break out of it.

Well, Steve’s got himself a new Harley, but the Harley is as essential as toilet paper to him. Bucky’s not sure if he wants a vehicle or not since Steve’s given him the second set of keys to the bike.

Finding clothes that haven’t already been worn or are in better shape than him is a chore in itself. He tosses a few holey shirts he finds on top of the dresser over his shoulder in despair. He isn't a slovenly creature, honest to God. He just can’t be bothered to buy clothes. He hates shopping the big box stores with their long lines and anxiety-causing crowds. Anything from the fancier places just pisses him off out of sheer ostentatious-ness. Stark’s tailors frankly scare the pants off him. So he solves the whole problem and gets the basics from the second-hand store down the road. Which, as he sees the state of his undergarment drawer, might be a place he needs to go today after therapy. Oh, hell, he might just splurge and go to Target, despite his disgust when he steps near the place. He opens his shirt drawer and Little Shit blinks up at him from her nest of old shirts, making him pause. “And how did you get in here?”

Little Shit yawns, her little teeth glinting from the streetlight outside.

Bucky smiles and pulls a gray shirt from behind her, upsetting her little bed. She grumbles and uses her claws to pull another shirt over. “You are strange, little one.”

The only answer he gets is another yawn and squeak, and he shuts the drawer again. If she got in there on her own, then she can get right back out. He snags a pair of jeans off the floor and decides to go bare-assed today. Not that anyone is going to see anything unless they really want to. He takes care not to disturb the wrap around his ribs as he pulls everything on, his badge from the latest scuffle the Avengers found themselves fixing. Dr. Banner insisted that he keep the bracing on for at least a day or two to make sure his ribs don’t heal all crooked-like. He hates the thing, but if he doesn’t do as Dr. Banner says, the man threatens him with hospital stays and Big Guy sitting on him until he cooperates. He’d rather not get sat on, so he deals with the wrap with the requisite amount of bitching.

 

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

 

When he’s finished dressing as much as he wants to put on this early in the morning, he opens his bedroom door to find Clint standing in the living room in his boxers, composite bow in hand and brace of arrows strapped around his hips. Bucky groaned. “Great.”

“What?” Clint sounds confused, like showing up in someone’s living room at fuck-all o’clock in the morning is somehow normal. Bucky gives up.

“How do you get in here, anyway? I’m pretty sure the door locks.”

“Y’think that can actually stop me?” Clint turns his owl eyes on him, and Bucky realizes he could be looking into the mirror, if he feels as bad as the archer looks. Or vice versa. If the stare that Clint’s giving him is any indication, it’s probably both. “Everyone thinks locks can stop me. I was a thief, y’know. I do locks.”

“I could, given enough time and enough Semtex, keep you from getting in here.” Bucky runs one hand through his hair and the other over his face, really feeling tired now. “Why are you here?”

Clint mimics Bucky, his taped fingers flicking lightly over an old bruise on his temple. “Rough night. I’m going to the roof to see if I can’t hit something this early in the morning on a couple minutes of sleep. You in?”

“Christ, I don’t even remember what time it is.” He really can’t. He remembers scowling at the clock, but not the numbers.

 

 

**Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep.**

 

Speaking of which, the thing is still blaring away. “Fucking alarm.”

Clint shrugs, brings the bow up with an arrow notched, and shoots into the darkness of the bedroom. The alarm stops. Bucky pointedly does not flinch, but his brain is crunching the numbers and comes up with aces. _Fucking hilarious. He wants to see if he can hit something this early? He just hit my alarm, which is under my bed. In the dark. He didn’t do it by sight, he did it by sound. Fuck if this guy isn’t the scariest out of all of these bozos._ “There. Bad alarm dead. Who cares what time it is, Robocop?”

“Fair enough. What the hell, why not. I’ll spot you.” He looks down. Something clicks, and he snorts. “You’re kidding.”

“What?”

“Now?”

Clint nods.

Bucky feels he might know why Steve tries to stay as far away from these people as humanly possible most days. “You are not wearing boxers and socks onto the roof.”

“Why not?”

“Jesus, at least take the socks off, shithead. They are green. I’d lend you some, but -” He wiggles his bare toes. “All mine are going into the trash today.”

Clint folds onto the floor and jerks his socks off, throwing them onto the armchair before getting to his feet again and heading to the door without another word. Bucky rolls his eyes and follows him out. He leaves the main door open so that Steve will know not to come looking for him. Now that everyone knows there’s an cat in the building, and since she’s gotten over her separation anxiety with help from JARVIS turning every television in the Tower to a bird-watching channel specifically for cats - who'da thunk? -  keeping her inside his flat doesn’t matter much anymore. They nick a twenty-four pack of beer from Steve’s fridge, careful not to wake him from the fitful sleep he's getting on his couch. Bucky can tell Steve’s had a rough night too by the bottle of whiskey and glass on the floor next to him and a copy of Good Omens open on his chest. “ G'mornin', meatball,” Bucky murmurs. “Thanks for the beer.”

**  
  
  
**

 

 

They pick a spot on the very cusp of the outlook off the side of Tony’s flight deck, on the outside of the safety railing. The ledge is just enough for two big, dangerous men and a case of beer to perch precariously over the lights of Manhattan without worrying too much about anything in particular, much less their mortality or lack thereof. It’s too damned early in the morning to be thinking of that. Clint’s iPod is sitting in its dock, the speakers bumping out a soft rhythm as he lines up for another shot. His selection of music is pretty good - at least, Bucky thinks so. He doesn’t have a lot of experience with the new stuff, but he’s learning. One Direction is a joke, but Alice In Chains is pretty cool. He sits next to the music, nursing his seventh beer and watching the sky lighten steadily around them. High above, an automated turret fired another puck into the expanse between buildings. Barefoot - hell, barely dressed - in December shouldn't be a good thing, but since the whole Loki thing that Bucky heard all about over chips, salsa, and a Riddick marathon, Clint doesn’t notice the cold as much as he used to. Bucky doesn't feel it at all thanks to the serum and all those damnable years spent in the barren wastes of Russia. So their breaths puff in the air and their noses redden as Clint stands out on the ledge and picks off two more pucks with one arrow. Bucky can see the arrow careen off the first puck to nail the second, and he’s just baffled. “How’d you do that?” Bucky honestly wants to know, because he saw it happen, but he doesn't see how it can.

Clint grins, his eyes glinting wetly in the chill of the growing dawn. “Math. Probability and predictions.”

“Nice.” Bucky toasts him. “Never was one for math, myself. I’m good at it, but I never liked it.”

Clint chuckles and taps his temple. “I see real well from a distance. Doesn’t just apply to my eyes.” He twists his body at the hips and lets another arrow fly. A puck behind him explodes with a pop. Bucky stares, and Clint’s grin grows. “That sort of shot got me all sorts of accolades in the circus.”

Bucky nods. “I was a sniper. Works the same way, I guess. Math, I mean. Windage. One click up, two clicks right.”

Clint nods back at him, then reaches down for his own beer. He swallows half. “We should start a club. ‘Brainwashed Assassins Anonymous’.”

Bucky snorts into his beer. He leans back against the railing and puts one hand down to steady himself, and finds a sock. He looks down. It’s green. It’s Clint’s sock. “What the hell?”

Clint fires off a rapid trio of shots, then turns to face him. “Sorry?” He sees what Bucky is staring at. “Aw, sock, how’d you get out here?” He looks to the small access door they came from. “Oh, wow. How did I forget that cats are thrill-seekers?”

Bucky turns around and loses himself to a fit of laughter. Little Shit is trotting out onto the ledge, her little legs bowed around Clint’s other sock as she pulls it along with her. He reaches out for her, grinning. “Wow is right. Where did you come from? Why do you do this to me? What are you doing with Clint’s socks?” Little Shit purrs and rubs against his hip and hands, meow-grumbling around the sock in her mouth. She piles it on the other one to ask for lovings, climbing up Bucky’s chest and shivering into his throat. “Poor thing. C’mere, outside is not a place for small creatures, and neither is the roof. Did you not learn your lesson when we met?” He wraps his metal hand, still warm somehow, around her back as she snuggles into his warmth. “Clint, I think she’s telling you to put your socks on.”

Clint presses a button low on the grip of his bow to turn off the turret and sits down next to Bucky and his little girl to put his socks back on his reddened feet. “If it means that much to you, pipsqueak, I’ll put them on. Okay? Sheesh, you’re as bad as Lucky.” His face falls suddenly.

Bucky and Little Shit look up at him. “Lucky?”

Clint avoids their eyes and focuses on straightening the toes of his socks. “When she left for California, she took him with her.”

Bucky has heard about Kate, too. He pulls a face and claps Clint on the shoulder. “They’ll be back.”

Clint nods, once. Hard. Huffs a bit. Scrubs a careful hand over Little Shit’s head. “Hey there, little sock-girl.” He looks back up at Bucky. “I’m not much of a cat person. I fuckin’ love dogs. But she’s growing on me.”

As if to show that she’s accepted Clint as one of the good people in her life, Little Shit crawled down from Bucky’s neck and over to Clint, promptly climbing him and settling into a little bun on the point of his shoulder. If Clint’s grin is a little watery, Bucky doesn’t say a word.

As the sun rises in the east, as it always does and always shall until its timely - or untimely, if some villains would get their way - end, Bucky makes another friend. And when Steve and Sam finally follow the trail of cat toys, paper clips, Bucky’s shirts and dish towels out to the catwalk, they find Clint in nothing but purple boxers and green socks firing arrows out into the void with a furry striped cat-bun on his shoulder and Bucky perched on the railing next to him, both calling out shots and drinking beer while the kitten yowls louder and louder to make up for her size.


End file.
